Watch: Attard and Delia clash in fiery Times Talk debate

Adrian Delia and Jonathan Attard clashed in their first face-to-face debate since the conclusion of international arbitration between Malta and Steward Health Care, during a Times Talk episode filmed on Wednesday.

Attard was speaking as justice minister while former opposition leader Delia waged a lengthy legal campaign that ended with a court annulling all contracts awarded to Steward and its predecessor Vitals Global Healthcare.

Throughout the fiery debate, the pair butted heads over who emerged on top in the arbitration proceedings, whether the government could have pursued a different legal route, and what the tribunal actually said about a €400 million sum supposedly stolen by Steward.

Armed with a stack of meticulously annotated documents in hand, almost certainly the various court sentences, reports and rulings handed down throughout this multi-year saga, neither Attard nor Delia held back once the cameras were rolling.

Attard declared that “Malta’s interests had prevailed” throughout the arbitration, with the government successfully swatting away Steward’s demands for €148 million in compensation and the tribunal confirming that the country had received the services for which it had paid.  

Malta did not win, Delia retorted, pointing out that the ruling’s very first page names the Maltese public as the failed concession’s ultimate victims.

What’s more, Delia said, the government only managed to defend its position on the back of a court sentence, in a case kicked off by Delia himself, which found there was “collusion” between Steward and senior government officials.

“This is not an award that changes or challenges the court’s decision in any way,” Delia explained throughout the debate, saying the government could never have successfully reclaimed any lost funds after it was found to be in cahoots with Steward by Malta’s courts.

Admitting that the government had based much of its defence on Delia’s successful court cases, Attard argued that the court sentence had effectively prevented the government from claiming damages.

The €400m ‘lie’ or ‘claim’?

Much of the debate was dominated by a dispute over whether the arbitration disproved a long-standing claim by Delia that  €400 million was stolen in the deal.

Repeatedly referring to the €400 million figure as a “lie,” Attard argued that the arbitration “established that for every penny spent, we received equal value in terms of services or investment,” Attard insisted.

What about your claim of €487 million?” Delia asked in reply, pointing to the government’s request for a discount on the services it received.

“Can the Minister tell us how the government substantiated this claim?” Delia asked, suggesting that the government had failed to do its utmost to reclaim these funds by not pushing the deal’s key players, including Konrad Mizzi and Chris Fearne, to testify in proceedings.

“We presented all the necessary proof,” Attard insisted, including expert witnesses and all available documentation.

The government’s claim for a discount stemmed from the concession’s failure to develop Malta’s medical tourism niche and invest in infrastructure, as it had promised to do over 30 years, Attard said.